


Holding On

by AceQueenKing



Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friends to Lovers, Missing Scene, Moving, Robot dog
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-07
Updated: 2017-08-07
Packaged: 2018-12-12 06:00:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11730960
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/pseuds/AceQueenKing
Summary: Vega helps Shepard move into Anderson's apartment.A memento from one of their most recent missions sparks an emotional conversation.





	Holding On

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Vorcha_Girl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vorcha_Girl/gifts).



James Vega has rarely been star struck in his life, but seeing Anderson's Citadel apartment – yeah, he has to admit it.

He's star struck.

He doesn't think he's ever seen a place as nice as this.  Anderson's place has three bedrooms, two bathrooms, the exercise equipment room of his dreams. He's tempted to ask if he can live here, except he's pretty sure a lieutenant’s salary wouldn't pay for a place this nice.

You need councilor money for that, he thinks with a sigh. He might be on the officer's track, but it's going to be a long haul before he gets up to the money that buys digs this nice. It'll probably be 20 years for the exercise room alone, he thinks ruefully as he hauls another box of Shepard’s stuff in from the skycar.

"You're a good man, Vega," Shepard grunts as she tosses her own box onto the ground of her new apartment. It lands with a loud _thwap_ and Vega hopes her downstairs neighbors aren’t too fussy. The last thing she needs is someone in a building this post complaining about _noise violations_. "Not too many lieutenants willing to help their captain on shore leave.

"You're not just any captain, ma’am," Vega says, smiling.

There’s a current that passes through them, and he feels it, knows she does too by the way she pauses, turns those pretty, wide brown eyes away. There’ssomething between them that, in another universe, one that preferably wasn’t being overrun with squid-machines intent on ruining all human life – something there that they’d both have acted on. But not something he can act on now, for all the frustration that it causes him.

Maybe _after_ , if there is an _after_.

"Ha," Shepard brushes the moment off, smiles. "Regardless, I appreciate it.”  
  
Shepard rots over to the kitchen and Vega tries not to think it’s because she wants distance. She grabs another box,  loading a few beverages into the fridge. He gets a look at the label of some beer as she puts it into place  – oh man, _asari t'salvi_ , the good stuff. He tries not to salivate _too_ hard when she puts one in the freezer. Couldn’t blame her if she’s thirsty.

 It’s hard work. And he’s thirsty too, though perhaps not quite in the same way.

"That one is for you, LT," Shepard said, a smile on her lips. “For when we finish moving this stuff up here.”

It’s enough to put a spring into his step. For the next ten trips, anyway.

By the eleventh, he’s struggling, and she is too; Lola’s slimmer than him and much more petite, but her biotic metabolism makes her a bigger glass cannon than he is and he can tell she’s straggling too. Still, she pulls her hair back and smiles and looks like nothing so much as perfect.

By the last trip they’re both sweating, but there’s a feeling of relief and they’re both laughing. The last item in particular is so ridiculous, he can barely believe she’s gotten it – a robot _dog._

He recognizes it, of course; it’s the same one she pulled down the wall at Sanctuary; an odd momento, but he hadn’t questioned it as she pulled it from the wreckage. It was a relatively small thing to keep in his cargo bay.

James watches between quick glances as Lola as she squats down to tenderly put down the robot dog at the entrance of her new place. It’s not like any of Anderson’s stuff, but he supposes it fits with Shepard’s collection. Like everything else they have on the ship, it's a stray, something its owners left behind when the Reapers attacked.

He wonders if they made it, the robo-dog's owner; he isn't sure. He hopes so. 

But given that they picked it up on sanctuary, he kind of doubts it.

Although hey, on the bright side, at least with Shepard squatting over it, he's getting a pretty primo view, and that's important too. Lola definitively doesn't skimp on her squats, despite her thin frame.

“Interesting nick-nack you’ve got there,” He says, trying to make conversation. The job is done but he doesn’t want to leave, doesn’t want to leave her alone.

“Yeah,” she says, shrugging. She sits down before it – if she wasn’t biotic, he thinks she would have been an engineer – activating it. He watches it sniff around its territory.

“These things were expensive, you know,” she says, softly. “Someone had to scrimp and save a long tie to buy this.”

“Yeah, well, makes sense, you know?” He shakes his head, tries for a joke. “I mean, considering how you do with fish, maybe you’d have better luck with – “

“That tank that Cerberus put in there is terrible for their health,” she says, grunting as she opens the refrigerator door. He doesn’t drive in the joke; he knows damn well the only reason any fish dies on Shepard’s watch is because they’re fighting too hard to get back to them.

She hands him a drink and he’s welcome for the diverion.  Vega did not need to be told twice to open it, and grabbed the nottle opener from her outstretched hands.  "Thank _you,_ ma’am."

"You're welcome," Shepard smiled. "Nice to treat someone who appreciates it."

Again the undercurrent of desire rippled through them. Shepard smiled and he did too, and dared to risk grabbing her hand and squeezing it.

If she felt the same jolt he did, she didn’t comment.

"Yeah, this whole place is damn nice," Vega said, glancing around. He couldn't imagine giving up such a place. Anderson must have been out of his gourd. The robot dog moved toward his leg, and he smiled, petting its head.

Shepard sighed and said nothing.

He looked at her and swallowed. “Everything okay, Lola?”

Shepard looked at him, took a long sip of her beer. "I'm sick of this shit, Vega. The people who’ve died, the things that were left behind, all the ones we couldn’t save…” She put the bottle down. “It doesn’t feel right, being in a place this nice when so many people are struggling. That’s why I brought the dog up. Gotta remind myself – “ She swallowed. James couldn’t help himself – regs be damned – and got up, curling his hands around her. She was so _damn_ small but so _damn_ strong.

“I gotta keep fighting,” she whispered, her arms curling around his neck. He held her close and pressed dangerously close to her, resting his head on hers and gripping her tight. To hell with regs, he thought, and dared to press a kiss to the top of her head.

She gripped him harder.

“I’m going to keep on with you, Lola,” James said, holding her as tight as he could and it still wasn’t enough.  “That’s why I’m gonna stay at your side, all the way until the end. And after, if you’d let me,” he said, and she looked up, those wide brown eyes widening as he dared to broach the subject of a long-term arrangement. “You’re gonna send those machines back to hell, Shepard. And I’m gonna be my your side, all the way.”

He stopped after that, suddenly self-conscious, and looked down. Shpard’s hand touched his cheek and he blushed, looking up only when she placed a hand on his cheek.

“You better stay,” she said, and he swallowed.

“Always.”

She didn’t fight to be let out of his arms so he just held her for a moment, his heart hammering in his chest.

Only Shepard’s Omni lighting up could make him let her go, and even then, he did not so do so willingly.

“Hackett,” she said, sighing. “Guess leave is over.”

“I’m right behind you,” he whispered hoarsely, as she turned to take the call.

He watched her in the light of this too-big apartment, thinking about how much the universe had lost, and how much they would lose if they didn’t have her, and he vowed that he would keep her safe, as long as his heart was still beating.

 


End file.
